In 1969, a man walked on the Moon for the first time. After this, many people thought that space travel would be available by the year 2000 and that we would all be space tourists. However, here we are in 2015 and space tourism is still an impossible dream for most of us. It is a reality for only a very few, very rich, people.
How would you get to your space hotel? In the future there may be hotels in space for all the tourists. It wouldn’t take long for the space shuttle to get out of the Earth’s atmosphere. Then, without Earth’ gravity, you would become weightless. Arrival at the hotel would be like an aeroplane parking at an airport but you would leave the cabin floating along the access tube, holding on to a cable.
What would a space Fact: The Russian Space Agency holiday be like? offers flights on board a spacecraft to Once in the hotel, you could the International Space Station (ISS), admire the unique views of where people can stay. The ISS was Earth and space and enjoy the built in 1998 and is so big that it can endless entertainment of being be seen from Earth. Tickets to the ISS weightless – and there would are very limited. always be the possibility of a space-walk.
Fact: The first tourist in pace was Dennis Tito in 2001. His trip cost him around £14 million.
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Who has already had a holiday in space?
In 2006, Anousheh Ansari became the first female space tourist when she made the trip from Russia to the International Space Station (ISS). Anousheh stayed on the ISS for eight days and kept a blog (an online diary). Parts of her blog are shown here.
Anousheh’s Space Blog September 25th Everyone wants to know: how do you take a shower in space? How do you brush your teeth? Well my friends, I must admit keeping clean in space is not easy! There is no shower with running water. Water does not ‘flow’ here, it ‘floats’ – which makes it a challenging act to clean yourself. There are wet towels, wet wipes and dry towels that are used. Now brushing your teeth in space is another joy. You cannot rinse your mouth and spit after brushing, so you end up rinsing and swallowing. Astronauts call it the ‘fresh mint effect’. September 27th Being weightless has some wonderful advantages. You can lift a really heavy object with one hand and move it around with one finger. You can fly and float around instead of walking. You can do somersaults at any age. Everything is effortless. If you want to move forward, you slightly touch a wall with one finger and you start moving in the opposite direction. If you have left your book at the other side of the module, no problem – you ask someone close to it to send it to you. That means they pick it up and very gently push it towards you, and here it is – your book flying to you all the way from the other side.
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Shooting stars Be a space tourist at home
While space travel is an impossibility for most of us, you can still be a tourist from here on Earth by spotting shooting stars! Space is full of huge and tiny pieces of rock, which burn up in a flash when they enter the Earth’s atmosphere. The flash of burning rock is called a meteor. As it moves through the night sky, you can see the trail it leaves behind – which is what we know as a shooting star. On most clear nights, you should be able to see up to 10 meteors every hour. But, at certain times of the year, many more meteors appear than usual. When this happens, we call it a meteor shower. Star spotters' guide to seeing shooting stars 1. Find out when a meteor shower is due and arrange to go star spotting with an adult (they don’t have to be an expert!). 2. Wear warm clothes and equip yourself with a blanket, a pillow and a torch. 3. You do NOT need a telescope or binoculars. 4. Go outside and find somewhere that is far away from town lights. 5. When you have found your spot, lie down on your blanket, switch OFF your torch and stare up at the sky. 6. Allow some minutes to pass. The longer you look, the more stars you will see as your eyes get used to the darkness. 7. Wait for the shooting stars to appear!
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2 1. Look at the introduction.
Why is space tourism impossible for most people?
______
______1 mark
2. How would you get from the spacecraft to the space hotel?
______
______1 mark
3. According to the text, what could you do on your space holiday?
Give two examples:
1. ______
2. ______2 marks
4. How much did the first space tourist pay to go into space?
______1 mark
5. How can you tell that the International Space Station is very large?
______
______1 mark
6. How did Anousheh’s trip into space make history?
______
______1 mark
Riverside+Primary+School Page 4 of 7 7. Look at the text box Who has already had a holiday in space?
Complete the table about Anousheh’s trip into space.
Where did she start her trip?
Where did she stay in space?
How long did she stay in space?
2 marks
8. Look at Anousheh’s blog entry for September 25th.
Find and copy a group of words that shows that Anousheh wrote her blog for others to read.
______
______1 mark
9. Look at Anousheh’s blog entry for September 27th.
Explain how Anousheh felt about being in space that day.
______
______
______
______2 marks
Riverside+Primary+School Page 5 of 7 10. Match the events below to the year in which they happened.
1 mark
11. Using information from the text, tick one box in each row to show whether each statement is a fact or an opinion.
Fact Opinion
Anousheh Ansari kept an online diary.
Brushing your teeth in space is a joy.
Being weightless is endlessly
entertaining.
Tourists can stay on the International
Space Station.
1 mark
12. …in a flash...
What does this tell you about the burning of rocks in space?
______
______1 mark
Riverside+Primary+School Page 6 of 7 13. Find out when a meteor shower is due and arrange to go star spotting with an adult…
In this sentence, the word arrange is closest in meaning to…
Tick one.
set out.
meet.
pack up.
plan.
1 mark
14. How does the information make it sound easy to be a star spotter?
Give two ways.
1. ______
______
2. ______
______2 marks
15. Tick true or false in the following table to show what you should do when spotting shooting stars.
True False
Take warm clothes, a blanket, a pillow
and a torch.
Stay close to town.
Point your torch up to the sky.
You must have binoculars.
1 mark
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